1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a multimedia data keyword management method for multimedia objects, and more particularly to a multimedia data keyword management method and a keyword data structure which enable addition of new keywords to a search system by feedback from a user.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, the technology for digital image signal processing has significantly been developed and has been applied in various fields. One field in which the digital image signal processing technology may be used is a search system for searching a particular object in image files such as a document, a movie, or a drama. Regardless of the method of searching, all search system must perform a prompt and exact search of the particular object.
In a search system for searching a multimedia object using a keyword, an operator of the search system assigns a specific keyword to a multimedia data. Thus, an multimedia object which matches a keyword entered by a user is searched for and displayed. In such process, each keyword is pre-assigned either manually or automatically by an object producer provided in the search system.
However, when actually using a search system based on keywords, it may be difficult for a user to enter a keyword which exactly matches a desired multimedia object. For example, a particular object may be mapped with a keyword of xe2x80x9cpicture,xe2x80x9d while a user may try to search the object with a keyword of xe2x80x9cimage.xe2x80x9d Accordingly, the user may not obtain a satisfactory result.
To solve this problem, U.S. Pat. No. 5,020,019 discloses a object search system which includes a table having Information of associated keywords and which performs a search using these similar keywords to which weight values are assigned by the user. Also, various keyword search engines include a table having similar words, thereby allowing a search system to perform a search referring to the table when a user enters a keyword. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,297,042 discloses such a search system.
In still another search system, a keyword definition structure is implemented, in which a definition matched with each keyword is hierarchically displayed on a user profile and is controlled by a feedback from a user. However, the hierarchical structure change by feedback is possible only for keywords already defined, and cannot be used for other similar keywords which has not previously been defined. Therefore, a user cannot perform a satisfactory search.
Additionally, while the search systems in the related art may provide various search approaches from a user, the predetermined keyword information for an object cannot be changed by feedback from the user. Namely, search systems in the related art based on similar word table or hierarchical structure try to determine a correct meaning of a keyword entered by a user, but can only return objects matched with predefined keywords stored in the search system and cannot provide a search result if a keyword entered by a user is not among the predefined keywords. Moreover, since the search systems in the related art uses only one table of similar words in managing the total multimedia objects, they cannot reflect different search patterns of various users.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to solve at least the problems and disadvantages of the related art.
An object of the present invention is to provide a more efficient multimedia data keyword management method in a search system including a data table having a plurality of multimedia objects mapped with one or more keywords.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a multimedia data keyword management method which can additionally register a new keyword to a data table through a feedback of a user according to a search result.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a keyword data structure for effectively performing multimedia object management in a multimedia object search system.
Additional advantages, objects, and features of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows and in part will become apparent to those having ordinary skill in the art upon examination of the following or may be learned from practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained as particularly pointed out in the appended claims.
To achieve the objects and in accordance with the purposes of the invention, as embodied and broadly described herein, a search system based on keyword comprises a user entering one or more keywords with respect to a plurality of multimedia objects stored in a search system; matching the keywords to a multimedia object management table controlled by the search system; searching and displaying a multimedia object matched with the keywords; the user verifying the displayed search result and feeding back one or more correct information to the search system by the user; and the search system determining whether the keywords used for the search are registered in a corresponding multimedia object management table and adding the keywords to the corresponding multimedia management table according to the determination result.
The search system further comprises determining the authorization class of the user who feeds back information when a keyword is added to the corresponding multimedia object management table; and allowing or restricting the addition of the keyword to the multimedia object management table depending on the authorization.
In another embodiment of the present invention, a multimedia search system based on keyword comprises a user generating one or more keywords with respect to a plurality of multimedia objects stored in a search system; matching the keywords with a multimedia object management table controlled by the search system; searching and displaying a multimedia object matched with the keywords; the user verifying the displayed search result and feeding back one or more correct information to the search system; the search system determining through the fed back information whether the keywords used for the search are registered in the corresponding multimedia object management table, and calculating the number of the feedbacks from the user with respect to the unregistered keywords; and the search system adding the unregistered keywords to the corresponding multimedia management table if the number exceeds a predetermined threshold value.
The calculation of the number of feedbacks further comprises determining whether a keyword is in a candidate keyword scheme of the search system, if the keyword used is not registered in the corresponding multimedia object management table; increasing the number of uses for the keyword if it is determined that the keyword is in the candidate keyword scheme; and adding a keyword to the candidate keyword scheme and initializing a number of uses, if it is determined that the keyword is not in the candidate keyword scheme.
A keyword data structure in a multimedia object search system according to the present invention comprises a used keyword scheme having keywords predefined by a multimedia object search system; and a candidate keyword scheme having candidate keywords obtained by a feedback from a user.